Helping others comes very naturally to most of us. The same with showing compassion and gratitude towards a friends, partner, even a stranger. We are deeply moved by images of suffering people in the news. The situation changes when we try to show the same attitude towards ourselves. For some reason is almost impossible to be a caring friend of yourself. Our loving nature flies out of the window when dealing with our own wrongdoings. The saying goes: “We are the harshest critics of ourselves”.
A wise person could offer an eloquent explanation here. I’m not going to do it! Instead I invite you to an experiment that may help you to turn the inner critic into a helping friend. I will call this project Helping Betty the Swettooth. Let me start with introducing you to my friend Betty. She an adorable gal! Cheerful and bubbly, always smiling, a great companion, with cute dimples in her cheeks. She has only one problem: choclate! She cannot help herself to reach for a piece every time she’s a bit stressed or under pressure from her boss. You know how it is:) After having the whole bar her stomach hurts and she doesn’t feel good.
So she asked me to help her out and remind her next time when I see her overindulging. Without hesitation I agreed: “It would be my pleasure to help you Betty!”. Now, when I see her reaching for her favorite treat I lovingly invite her to reconsider and guess what: she always does, moreover she appreciates my help very much because her stomach doesn’t hurt any more!
Our personality has many layers and each of these layers require our attention. Some traits take care of themselves, others need special treatment and there’s nothing wrong with that. Creating a character out of a problem may assist you in dealing with it better. Turn your weakness into your strengt. Bob the Grumpus, Jenny the Procrastinator even Harry Judgmental are really nice fellows if you only help them to deal with their problem! And since you love to be helpful it’s a WIN-WIN situation:)
PRACTICE:
- Pick one thing from your everyday life that you have difficulty dealing with.
- Imagine a lovable character that could play this role. Be creative and take your time.
- Give your character a cute name, have some fun with it, no need to be too serious, regardless how serious the problem is.
- Make yourself acquainted with your new friend. Let him/her describe the problem and offer your help.
- From now on every time during the day you notice the problem, turn to your new friend and try to offer assistance in most KIND a LOVING way.
- Spend a couple of days getting to know your new friend.
- Making friends is much more fun than dealing with problems!